Although Apple’s portable computers are rather resilient, people still want to find ways to prevent scratches and dings on the aluminum surface. A popular accessory has been the hard shell case, often a plastic shell that snaps on a few key areas and protects the computer from cosmetic damage. These can also give an otherwise familiar-looking MacBook some personality and provide a empty canvas for stickers. Although the popular models seem to come from companies like Speck and Incase, iPhone case manufacturer Uncommon offers its own version, the Deflector…

Apple has made some changes to its iOS lineup—the iPad 4 replaced the iPad 2 and an iPhone 5C was introduced with 8GB of storage. While it might seem odd that Apple is making two lower-end products available, it means that Apple has more cohesive offerings. By replacing the iPad 2 with the iPad 4 at $399 (16GB), Apple now only sells iPads with Lightning connectors, and save for the non-Retina iPad mini, Retina Displays and A6/A7 processors. This makes the iPad family much like the iPhone family right now—unless you’re really cheap (and maybe uninformed), you’re going to get anything other than the iPhone 4s.

Speaking of iPhones, the smaller capacity iPhone 5C is being sold only in UK, France, Germany, Australia, and China at the moment, for £40 less if you were to buy it outright. If this eventually does replace the 4s at the low-end, this would mean no iPhones with Dock Connectors, 3.5″ displays, or less-than-A6 processors. In fact, this would make the iPod classic the only product with a Dock Connector.

I often have my iPad sitting on my desk displaying something when I’m not using it—usually it’s some sort of entertainment media, a weather map, or stock quotes. Still, there are times when I feel like it’s just displaying something to justify its presence on my desk. Avatron Software hopes to give your iPad (or iPhone, Android device, Mac, or Windows PC) another use by becoming a second display for your computer. Air Display is a tool aimed at anyone that could temporarily use some extra screen space…

Apple just released the huge update for iOS 7, fixing some things visually, adding some additional accessibility options, turning on CarPlay support, and squashing some bugs. Some unexpected additions are manually controlling Siri, a redesigned Calendar (I use Fantastical though), and automatically enabling the camera’s HDR mode on the 5S. The update is about 200MB-300MB and available through Software Update on the device (Settings > General > Software Update) or iTunes.

I’ve updated my iPhone 5 already and am mostly happy with the default changes—I would use Button Shapes if it had more of a dark outline than a grey blob behind my buttons. I actually think the biggest improvement is stability and responsiveness.

Apple is losing another member of its leadership team—this time it’s a planned transition. Peter Oppenheimer, the company’s senior vice president and CFO will retire at the end of September, and be replaced by Luca Maestri, Apple’s vice president of Finance and corporate controller, a position that Oppenheimer himself once held. Oppenheimer started at Apple in 1996…